Roy Wilson was a United Methodist pastor for 47 years in five different states at more churches than he can remember. Since retiring 24 years ago, Wilson now speaks four to five days a week but he’s never preached at Pulpit Rock in The Dalles.
That will change Sunday, May 17, when Wilson leads a community service where his great grandfather, Stephen Gascoigne, preached more than 130 years ago.
The worship service will begin at 11 a.m. A meet-and-greet is scheduled for Saturday, May 16 at First United Methodist Church, 305 E. 11th St., The Dalles, at 6 p.m.
“I’ve desired to do this for many years,” Wilson said. “What an honor to speak where my great grandfather stood and preached. That’s so exciting.”
Wilson’s great grandfather was born in Oxford, England in 1844 but came to the United States with his parents when he was 16 years old, just in time to serve as a drummer boy in the Civil War. After the war was over, Gascoigne went to school and earned his bachelor’s, master’s and doctorate degrees. He was a college professor and then on staff at the Smithsonian Institute in Washington, D.C. before he felt God was calling him to the ministry.
Gascoigne took his young bride to Independence, Missouri, where they bought a covered wagon and traveled along the Oregon Trail. He served on a circuit with five Methodist Episcopal churches in the John Day area for a year before being transferred to The Dalles in 1884.
At 7 years old, Wilson remembers sitting on his great grandfather’s lap, not long before he died at an old soldier’s home in Southern California.
“He was a very warmhearted, gentle old man when I met him,” Wilson said.
Wilson was born on the Yakama Indian Reservation in White Swan, Washington. During the great depression, his father, a Native American, moved the family to Southern California looking for work.
It was Wilson’s mom who had a real impact on his life spiritually. She taught Wilson how to read and write before he even got to Kindergarten and at four years old, he wrote his first book. It had two chapters — “I love Jesus” and “I love God.” Around the same age, Wilson told his mom God wanted him to be a preacher when he grew up.
After skipping the second grade and getting through high school a year early, Wilson graduated when he was 16. Too young to enlist in World War II, he went to seminary in Springfield, Missouri. Wilson was pastoring his first church when he was 17.
Throughout his 47 years of service in the United Methodist Church, Wilson continued his education by taking classes at 11 different colleges or seminaries. He’s also been a professor.
“I ended up with a very wide variety education,” Wilson said. “Rather than a rifle shot, it was more like a shotgun shot.”
Wilson is also an honorary chief of the Cowlitz Indian Tribe and was on the tribal council for 36 years. He serves as the tribal shaman, leading all the sanctioned ceremonies and rituals.
Wilson had to learn how to be both a good Indian and Christian.
“In the earlier days, having been raised in a very fundamentalist tradition, I was taught that if I wanted to be a good Christian I would have to give up those evil heathen pagan Indian ways,” Wilson said. “For a number of years there was a real struggle that went on in my life until I began to see the harmony between the two and then it was no longer very difficult at all.
“It depends on your perspective. If you’re looking at comparative religion from a fundamentalist point of view and that your way is the only true way, you’re going to have nothing but violence. You don’t look at the differences between the two religions. I discovered you look at the similarities and when you find the similarity it all blends together and it becomes a very in-depth spiritual journey.”
Wilson will go to his Indian background when he speaks at Pulpit Rock, preaching from Isaiah 40:31 — “But those who hope in the Lord will renew their strength. They will soar on wings like eagles; they will run and not grow weary, they will walk and not be faint.”
“In my Native American culture, we learn many lessons from the animals,” Wilson said. “It will be a very Christian Biblical sermon, not Indian, but my insights come from my Indian world.”
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